Lab Rats?
by bionic4ever
Summary: Steve and Jaime's responses to Rudy's question, How do you really feel about being bionic?
1. Chapter 1

**Lab Rats ?**

Chapter One

**Case #87311/JSB-Steve Austin**

I try not to think about crashing the Daedelus – the accident that resulted in my becoming a case number. It was the only time I've ever battled a machine where the machine was victorious. My memories of that day are only partial ones, anyhow: the plane refusing to do what I was telling it to do, to level off; the ground coming up on me, way too fast; the heat of the fire. Those are all bearable memories, things I've learned to deal with. Sure, the loss of a billion-dollar aircraft was hard to swallow and an awful exclamation point to end a career, but what really bothered me was the loss of a big part of my _humanity_.

There was a lot of time during recovery with nothing to do but lie there and think, and there were basically only two things on my mind. The first was that this was no longer **me**, no longer my body, and what did that make me? Sub-human, or something even less than that? My second thought was of...**_Jaime._** We weren't even together then – hadn't been for years – but my heart has belonged to her since my first day in third grade. Somehow, I always knew we'd find each other again. Lying in that hospital bed, though, I had to wonder if she'd ever be able to even look at someone who was now just half a man.

A couple of times, right after "it" happened, I tried to make a permanent exit. Rudy asked me this morning, when we started this little survey of his, if I still felt they should've let me die, instead of tampering with nature and fate. The answer? Yes – and no. Yes, because I do believe I wasn't _supposed _to survive that crash. No, because of...**_Jaime_**.

Knowing how I feel about my own bionics (a necessary but unpleasant reality), I can't always square in my own mind how I could be presumptuous and selfish enough to have made that same choice for Jaime. I mean, years after my own accident, I still struggle every day with the thought of human versus machine inside my own body. How could I have made the same choice for the woman I love more than life itself?

Rudy asked me about nightmares; there's my biggie, and it isn't my own accident. On my very worst nights, when I close my eyes, I'm seeing Jaime falling through the sky, suddenly without a parachute. I've never hated my bionic eye more than when it zeroed in to see her face as she realized what was about to happen. Yes, she knew, even if she mercifully doesn't remember it. Should I have jumped up, tried to catch her and break her fall? Rudy tells me that even with bionic legs, it would've been a physical impossibility and we'd likely both have died on impact. Still, I wonder sometimes if I could've saved her from all of this, if only...

Once she hit the ground, I held her in my arms while we waited for the ambulance. It almost felt like my life was draining away at the same time as hers. She was dying, and a part of my soul was dying right along with her. Jaime had been a part of my life for as long as I could remember, and when the doctor came out and told us there really wasn't any hope, I couldn't even begin to imagine my life without her in it. I saw her lying on that table, and she knew it was over for her; she'd already begun to accept it, but I just couldn't.

Calling Oscar and convincing him to make Jaime bionic was the most selfish thing I've ever done, and for all the wrong reasons. I can't say I regret it, because she's still alive, happy and doing well. Jaime tries to spare my feelings, but I know even she wonders sometimes if it was the wrong thing to do. I think her amnesia was fate's way of saying 'How dare you, Steve?' and I deserved what happened between us for the cavalier way I chose to put her through pain I could barely endure myself.

Now, it seems the fates saw fit to give us back to each other for one more try, and as I hold her in my arms, I know that Jaime is my saving grace, the answer to all of my internal struggles. She is _human _– 100 percent – and that means that I am, too.

- - - - - -


	2. Chapter 2

Chapter Two

**Case #87312 – Jaime Sommers**

I don't remember my accident, and since most of the rest of my memory has come back, Rudy says I probably never will. Thank God for small favors (or, in this case, a big one)! I do remember waking up in the emergency room with Steve beside the gurney, trying to look brave and sound reassuring. I knew better; things were _not_ ok. I felt myself sort of fading, and right before I passed out, Steve asked me to trust him, that he knew a way to possibly save me. Of course, I nodded. I wanted him to feel at least a little better about things, but I was sure I'd never be waking up again. I had no idea what that single nod was signing me up for!

I'd never even heard the word 'bionic' before! The first morning after the surgery, when I woke up, everything – arm, legs, etc. - _looked_ so normal that I thought the night in the ER was just a really bad dream. I mean, I _saw_ that my arm was gone. Not broken, or even shattered – just...gone. My legs had looked a lot like hamburger, from what I could see. Then, all of a sudden, I wake up and there's not a scratch or bruise to be seen. Had to be a dream, right? When Steve told me the truth, I freaked out all over him. I'd never been so angry, or so scared. Steve knew just what to say, though, and how to say it. The fact that I wasn't alone and that **_Steve_** had been there and would help me through it helped me to calm down and put it all in the right perspective. I was alive!

Once the panic was out of my system, it was fascinating to slowly discover all the things my new legs and arm could do! Scary, but really exciting. Plus, no one could ever simply step out of the room to talk about me again!

Rudy asked about nightmares, and yeah – I had a few, especially in the beginning. I used to dream I was all alone, off in a corner somewhere, one arm and no legs and unable to do anything. Everyone else had gone and left me alone in my dark little corner, forgotten forever. The other nightmare was an old standard: falling endlessly, and knowing that if you reach the bottom, you die. By the time I finally left the hospital, the nightmares were pretty much gone.

Steve and I had so much fun, training together while he helped me get up to full strength! At 40 or 50 miles per hour, he was still teasing me about being a slowpoke. Then again, he's been teasing me since I was five years old. One afternoon, Steve proposed and I thought life couldn't possibly get any better, but in the blink of an eye, it was all just _gone. _We hadn't even finished planning the wedding when I – died. Still seems really weird to say that, but it's true.

I remember waking up in the hospital and having no clue who or where I was. Steve ended up having to let me go when I couldn't remember him. I tried so hard that it caused real, physical pain, and that's when Steve knew he had to say goodbye and leave me in the doctors' hands. It took me way too long to realize the strength of character and the depth of love he showed by doing that for me. He never stopped hoping, though, and I think somewhere deep inside of me, a tiny part kept that invisible torch burning, too. That has to be why things never got deeper with Michael; my inner voice knew he wasn't _the one_.

Once Helen found out Steve and I were bionic, she pointed out that now we were truly 'made for each other' and she's right. Who else could know what we go through, or share what we share? To this day, Steve feels guilty for signing me up for this 'miracle' called bionics, because of the problems – physical and emotional – that we've had to deal with. I know in my heart-of-hearts, though, that when he finally puts that ring on my finger and we kiss, he'll know he made the right decision.

END


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